Awaiting Passage
by sapphireswimming
Summary: CoS AU. Through the teeming sea of swirling people, two boys meet and together embark upon an adventure that will save their lives. Happy FMA Day.


**This is a "Conqueror of Shamballa" Alternate Universe plotline.**

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**Awaiting Passage  
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October 3, 2012

_Happy FMA Day. Remember 3.10.11_

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Alfons didn't quite know what to do now, lost in the sea of swirling people with a purpose, vision, destination that he had been denied. So he sat on a crate at the base of a lamppost, not needed now in the bright noonday sun, and stared outward, not even trying to wrack his brain for a new plan because he knew that none would come.

He didn't know how long he sat there. Hours maybe. Or minutes. He couldn't tell. He didn't really care.

But his peaceful rest was interrupted by a clanging step bouncing on the other side of his crate. He turned to see clunky black boots filling his field of vision. Traveling upward, his gaze fell upon a golden haired youth wearing a brown tweed suit. A red jacket covered the blissfully normal looking white collared shirt, however, to make him an odd sight.

This young man looked out over the crowd, one hand shielding his eyes from the light as his golden eyes roved through the rows of teeming humanity. "Where is that bastard?" he muttered harshly under his breath. "Take your eyes off him for one minute and he abandons you."

Alfons blinked, not knowing what to make of the young man who snorted and seethed, "Figures."

The blond humphed and turned to look in the other direction as well, sweeping the entire square to no avail, apparently, as he continued to talk to himself. "Everyone here is too tall. Freaks of nature…" he groused as he put his hands to his hips and finally spoke to the person sitting at his feet. "Hey, you seen a blond bastard in a suit come by here?"

Alfons started when he realized he was being addressed. Although he had been staring at the people in front of him for a long while now, he realized that he hadn't taken notice of a single one. The man this boy was looking for might well have walked within a yard of him, but he didn't know. "Um… I don't think so," he responded quietly.

"Some help you are," the figure in red sighed.

"Sorry, I wasn't…" Alfons trailed off, suddenly wondering why he was apologizing to the person who had so rudely commandeered his wooden crate.

The boy looked down. Blinked. Then quickly sat down on the box next to him, hesitant, but looking like he wanted to say something.

"Hey," he tried with a sharp nod of his head. "The name's Ed," he said, extending a hand.

Alfons took it. "Alfons Heidrich," he replied. The other boy grinned quickly, then let the movement die. "Nice to meet you."

They sat awkwardly together on the crate, neither person knowing what to say now that introductions had been taken care of. Alfons would have been perfectly content to go back to his quiet contemplation of the busiest part of the city, but Edward seemed to have no intentions of leaving him in peace, and even seemed to be searching for something with which to strike up a conversation.

"My old man took off without me," he stated loudly. "And I'm stranded here till I find him again." He nodded, pleased with his choice of words. "So…" he waved a hand vaguely in front of him. "Why are you here? You alone? What's your story?"

"My Dad left too."

"Damn," Ed spat. "He would leave you too!" with a vehemence that startled Alfons and suddenly make his blood boil at the implications this stranger was so quickly making about his family.

"No, it wasn't like that. You don't understand," Al defended.

Ed's eyes softened and he relented. "Alright," he said, verbally backing down from his aggressive stance of a moment before. "Tell me then, since we're both just sitting around."

Alfons blinked and looked back out at all of the people. "I come from a large family. We lived in a small town in Germany and had saved for years for the price of tickets to America. And well… life was rough where we lived. I worked in the factory and… my best mate and I both got sick last year. He died. And I used up too much of the family funds seeing a doctor." He paused, licked his lips. "We were finally going to make it, were all here and then…"

"Then…?" Ed hesitantly supplied when he trailed off.

"Then the doctor wouldn't pass me through. It was the sickness I had, you see. Hadn't gone away completely. Dad wanted us all to stay together, but I told him to go on without me."

"Couldn't you have just waited to get better and then gone as a group?"

Al paused. "That wasn't…" he floundered for words that wouldn't give him away. "I don't have money for medicine," he finally settled on.

"I see."

"And I couldn't deprive my family of that chance. They deserved it. Needed it. They couldn't survive going back, living the way they were when they had been offered this dream. So they're gone now."

"And you?"

"And… I'm stuck here." Saying it aloud made it even worse.

The two sat in silence for a minute until Ed broke it. "What are you going to do now?"

"I have no idea," Al said, his hands moving uselessly in front of him to keep them from covering his face. Because then he knew he wouldn't be able to stop the flow of emotion. "I just thought I'd sit here and could eventually come up with something."

As he finished speaking, both boys realized just how poorly that plan would realistically work. Alfons fiddled with his hands nervously. Ed's brows furrowed as he stared at the dust between his boots, chewing his lip and weighing his next words carefully.

"You know…" he began, still looking at the ground. "You could always…"

"Well, well, well; there you are, Edward!" a cheerful voice interrupted, walking up to the pair. Alfons looked up to see a tall blond man who smiled sheepishly as his eyes squinted shut behind his glasses. "I was wondering where you'd run to. This is a thick crowd isn't it?"

Ed knew who it was without looking up. Gritting his teeth and clenching his fists, he tried not to yell as he responded, "Who are you calling so small that you couldn't find me in the eye of a needle in a haystack? And I wasn't the one who ran away, you were the one who just up and left me! Again. Bastard."

The man didn't appear fazed at all by the rough verbal treatment and turned to Alfons with a smile which changed as soon as he got a good look at the boy. "So… what do we have here?"

"Oh yeah!" Ed exclaimed, finally looking up from his fixed point on the ground to look at his companion. "Take a look at who I found. This is Al. Alfons." He corrected after a short pause. Then, with an offhanded gesture to the man standing in front of them, "This bastard is Hoenheim. He's my dad."

For the first time, father and son made eye contact. Ed pierced him with golden eyes as he explained the other boy's situation. "He needs to get around the medical tests in order to get approved passage to America. I thought that since we were already going the roundabout way, we might be able to all travel together and work things out."

"Wait a minute," Alfons interjected, suddenly panicked and embarrassed that this boy would take up his case. "I didn't say anything about…"

"That's alright," Ed waved off his concerns. "You do want to get to America, don't you?"

"Yes," Alfons admitted.

"And you need to either get better really fast or get around the medical examiners in order to do that, right?"

"I suppose so." Alfons looked at the ground uncomfortably.

"Well," Edward said with a large grin. "We can help with either of those. We have to go through special measures to get our passage figured out anyway since I don't have any papers…."

"What?" Alfons started. "Why not?"

"Some fires in Germany," he said lightly. "And anyway, my dad's a special case. He's a professor at university. And he's got this weird condition that the docs can't explain, so he needs to jump through a couple extra hoops every time he wants to cross the pond. But since we're doing all of that anyway, having you tag along won't make any more trouble for us, would it?" he looked up at the man.

"Not at all," his father concurred. "It would be a pleasure to travel with you."

"But…" Al protested. "You don't know me at all! How can you just agree to let me join you?"

"Eh, that's okay," Ed shrugged. "You seem like a pretty decent guy. And we'll have plenty of time here to get to know each other as we get everything in order. If you decide you want out by the time we're ready for the boat, then I guess we'll just have to part ways. But I think it works out to everyone's advantage this way."

"But, but how can I ever repay you?" Alfons shouted in dismay. "I don't have any money…"

"Don't worry about it," Edward assured him with a hand to his shoulder. "It will be really fun having you along. It will be like we're brothers!" Ed exclaimed with a laugh that was a little too loud. "I've always wanted a younger brother named Al."

Hoenheims' eyes clouded over with a dulled pain, but neither boy saw it.

Al chuckled at what he thought was Ed's ridiculous claim and finally caved in when all of his many concerns had been addressed or glossed over as if they truly didn't matter to the father and son. "Alright," he agreed with the first smile he'd had since his family left. "If you're willing to have me, I'd love to come with you."

Ed fist pumped into the air. "Alright!"

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**I'm not continuing, so this is officially up for adoption. If you want it, come and talk to me.**


End file.
